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The increasing use of natural resources and the pollution it causes calls for new ways of addressing customer needs. Additionally, a more uncertain and complex world also presents new challenges. In this thesis, these new challenges are tackled through inter and transdisciplinary research, which require more interaction across disciplines to tackle complex phenomena. The manner in which companies address customer needs starts from the designing (a multiplestakeholder perspective) of offerings where companies rely on different types of support (guidelines, standards, methods and tools). In this thesis, these offerings, include products, services, systems, and solutions. This plays an important role in the use of natural resources and its impact on the environment. In this Licentiate, I present results to show initial cues on how to design resource-efficient offerings, and more specifically their analysis and evaluation in the early stages of the design process. This type of offerings is suggested to be crucial for the circular economy, which can be understood as a paradigm shift towards sustainability. In this paradigm shift, designing is carried out by taking into account reuse, remanufacture and recycling of products as strategies by multiple stakeholders and companies. Other strategies include providing services, a function or a solution through dematerialization and transmaterialization. The methods used in this research are narrative and systematic literature reviews, thematic analysis and a case study. The results show a lack of interdisciplinary research in the academic literature in subjects relevant to the design of resource-efficient offerings. The results also show a need to clarify what transdisciplinary research entails. Moreover, current practice shows that support used by companies needs to consider several factors for it to be useful, for example, the vision of the company, participation of potential users of the support and everyday operations, among other characteristics. Finally, more practical support coming from academia is necessary to improve its use in industry.
Human activities in the form of production and consumption have increased to an all-time high. In many cases, this increase has resulted in environmental problems such as waste and pollution that, in turn, affect our health and way of living. Societies have proposed different measures to address such environmental problems. These range from different waste treatment technologies to alternative business models, policy measures, and lifecycle thinking in the design of products, to mention but a few. In this research, the focus is on supporting early design activities of what is often called the conceptual design stage with the objective to provide effective and resource-efficient offerings. The early design activities considered here are planning, analysis, and evaluation. Design researchers have largely supported these three activities with a variety of methods and tools. However, previous research has shown that design support coming from academia has had a low uptake in industry. In this regard, the aim of this research is to propose not only useful but also usable support for design practitioners during the conceptual design stage. This research is carried out in the manufacturing sector in Sweden, where selected companies expressed an interest in collaborating with academia to address more thoroughly effective and resource-efficient offerings. To better match company needs and research from academia, this research took a pragmatic and cross-disciplinary approach. This research approach, along with literature reviews, semi-structured interviews, workshops, and questionnaires, shows different ways in which support can be made more useful and usable. The main gap addressed here is that the knowledge and the related skills of the user of the support have not been sufficiently explored. The results include requirements of the user of the support, proposed methods and tools derived from the requirements identified, and, most importantly, the knowledge and skills needed by the user of the support. The main message of this research is that support could be expanded from methods and tools to include knowledge and skills needed by design practitioners, the users of support. The flow of support from academia to industry could also be reinforced in a two-way flow through a pragmatic and cross-disciplinary approach to first and foremost address design practitioners’ needs. Mänskliga aktiviteter i form av produktion och konsumtion har aldrig varit högre. Denna ökning över tid har i många fall lett till miljöproblem som avfall och föroreningar, vilka i sin tur påverkar vår hälsa och levnadssätt. För att möta dessa miljöproblem har olika åtgärder föreslagits, som tekniker för avfallshantering, alternativa affärsmodeller, policy och livscykeldesign, för att nämna några. Fokus i forskningen som presenteras i denna avhandling är på tidiga designaktiviteter, vilka ofta kallas det konceptuella designstadiet och som syftar till att ta fram resurseffektiva erbjudanden. Detta steg behandlas här genom att närmare undersöka designaktiviteterna planering, analys och utvärdering. Designforskare har till stor del stöttat dessa tre aktiviteter med en mängd olika metoder och verktyg. Emellertid visar tidigare forskning att designstöd från akademin har ett lågt upptag i industrin. Syftet med denna forskning är därför att föreslå ett användbart stöd som också är användarvänlig för utövare under det konceptuella designstadiet. För att uppnå detta genomförs forskningen inom tillverkningssektorn i Sverige där deltagande företag uttryckt ett intresse av att samarbeta med akademin avseende resurseffektiva erbjudanden. För att bättre matcha företagens behov med forskning från akademin antas en pragmatisk och tvärvetenskaplig strategi. Denna strategi, tillsammans med litteraturöversikter, semistrukturerade intervjuer, workshops och enkäter visar hur stödet i det konceptuella designstadiet kan bli mer användbart och användarvänlig. Den huvudsakliga forskningsluckan som tas upp här är att kunskap och relaterade färdigheter hos användaren av stödet inte har undersökts tillräckligt. Resultatet ger en beskrivning av kraven på de stöd som användaren behöver, föreslag på metoder och verktyg som baseras på de identifierade kraven och, viktigast av allt, den kunskap och de färdigheter som användaren av stödet behöver ha. Huvudbudskapet är att stöd kan utvidgas från att omfatta metoder och verktyg till att även inkludera behovet av kunskap och färdigheter hos designutövare, det vill säga användarna av supporten. Stödet från den akademiska världen till industrin kan också förstärkas genom att bli ett tvåvägsflöde som med en pragmatisk och tvärvetenskaplig strategi först och främst adresserar användarens behov.
What a company offers its customers has to fulfil several different needs, desires, constraints, which can originate from multiple different sources that affect the offering throughout its life cycle. All these criteria have to come together and be translated into statements that can support the designer’s understanding of the offering’s purpose. This translation is done through a requirements development process to provide a controlled process to define statements that describe what the offering is supposed to fulfil. This research provides insights on key challenges and success factors in requirements development to support the design of effective and resource-efficient offerings. Namely, it identifies crucial sources and aspects to be considered, and a requirements development process demonstrating how to overcome identified challenges. By getting the requirements right from the beginning, sub-optimisation and unnecessary time and risks can be avoided. The consideration of accurate sources and aspects is considered to be one of the most important factors for the successful design of offerings. It is also in the earliest phases of design, that is to say requirements development, where one has the greatest possibility to affect the environmental impact of the offering. What is missing, however, is sufficient and appropriate support in industry on how to do so. The gap between the three areas of effectiveness and resource efficiency, design of integrated offerings, and requirements development has been investigated. Results are based on findings in the literature and in industry, identified primarily by qualitative studies. In the research, 15 different companies have been included through a number of interviews and discussions. Key sources and aspects to consider in the requirements development process are identified along with challenges, and success factors that can be utilised to overcome the identified challenges. This research’s final results include an adapted requirements development process that considers the earlier-mentioned sources and aspect, challenges, and success factors. Such a requirements development process should support the design of effective and resource-efficient offerings.
This two-volume set LNCS 11576 and 11577 constitutes the thoroughly refereed proceedings of the 11th International Conference on Cross-Cultural Design, CCD 2019, which was held as part of the 21st HCI International Conference, HCII 2019, in Orlando, FL, USA, in July 2019. The total of 1275 papers and 209 posters included in the 35 HCII 2019 proceedings volumes were carefully reviewed and selected from 5029 submissions. CCD 2019 includes a total of 80 papers; they were organized in topical sections named: Part I, Methods, Tools and User Experience: Cross-cultural design methods and tools; culture-based design; cross-cultural user experience; cultural differences, usability and design; aesthetics and mindfulness. Part II, Culture and Society: Cultural products; experiences and creativity; design for social change and development; cross-cultural product and service design; intercultural learning.
The world manufacturing companies operate in is changing. In the past, these companies relied on the design and sale of products. Today, this linear model of business is becoming increasingly insufficient. As customers are more and more focused on their core business, buying and operating machinery and other goods becomes unattractive to them. In response to this, manufacturing companies are expanding their value capture into additional stages of the product lifecycle by providing integrated offerings of products and services — Product-Service Systems (PSSs). Designing and providing PSSs is fundamentally different from traditional product sales. Expanding to become a PSS provider is, therefore, challenging for companies with a history of designing and selling products. Departing from this, it is the aim of this thesis to support manufacturing companies in their expansion to effective and efficient design and provision of PSSs. The research reported has both descriptive and prescriptive properties, reflecting the goals of understanding the status quo in manufacturing companies’ practice and providing support based on this. To establish a point of departure, the current design and provision of two manufacturing companies expanding their business towards PSSs was investigated. From this, an in-depth understanding of the status quo and a number of challenges emerged. Based on this, the research had the goal to contribute to identifying and developing solutions to these challenges, with an initial focus on methods supporting PSS design and provision. However, although methods fitting to the challenges identified exist, they appear to receive limited uptake in manufacturing companies’ practice. In order to improve their practical utility, a structured method is proposed to assist users in both academia and practice in developing methods in a requirements-oriented fashion. The utility of methods in improving the efficiency and effectiveness of PSS design and provision is thereby to be enhanced. A particular challenge for manufacturing companies expanding to become PSS providers is the change in how value is captured: Resulting from the extensive involvement throughout the lifecycle, a need for a broader, multidimensional understanding of value capture was identified. However, the manufacturing companies investigated have been found to experience challenges in grasping this change, with a focus on a product sales-centric understanding of value capture remaining prevalent. To support companies towards reaping the benefits of the expansion to PSS design and provision, methods to explore how value is currently created and captured in the use phase and how to enhance the future value capture based on that information in the design phase have been developed and applied. As a result, broadly relevant value dimensions were attained, aiming to facilitate a lifecycle-focused, effective, and efficient design and provision of PSSs. Eventually, to broaden the understanding of effective and efficient design and provision of PSSs in practice today, the potential contributions of real-world PSSs to a circular economy were investigated based on an existing framework. The result was ambiguous, indicating both advancements compared to traditional sales and substantial room for improvement, particularly with a focus on the absolute decoupling of economic activity and resource use. Based on the synthesis of the research results, manufacturing companies are supported in their expansion to effective and efficient design and provision of PSSs — and towards a promising future.
The unsustainable levels of resource use and emissions of our economies and their threat to future generations are core issues of our time. The circular economy (CE) conceptualises a different type of economy that is restorative and regenerative by design and aims to keep products, components and materials at their highest utility and value at all times, distinguishing between technical and biological cycles. The novelty of the CE requires the development of new analytical tools and methods as well as ways of thinking to understand its consequences. This research summarises four years of research on the topic of systems analysis and simulation modelling in the domain of the CE. Three topics were of major interest: First, what are the resource efficiency implications of a shift toward a CE? Second, what are the operational implications of a shift to a CE? And finally, how can systemic changes towards a CE be understood and planned? Four studies were conducted addressing the three research questions. The first study applies material flow analysis to a washing machine manufacturer case and looks at how different business models affect the resource flows of critical resources. It finds that service-based offerings lead to higher overall resource efficiency. The second study focuses on the implications of CE initiatives on the maintenance activities of a heat-as-a-service provider. It shows that the shift to service-based offerings requires service providers to face worse-before-better situations where long-term benefits offset short-term disadvantages. The third study is a simulation-based case study of laundry practices in Sweden. It compares a sharing economy scenario where a population shares washing machines with a scenario where the majority of people own the washing machines they are using. The results indicate that in Sweden and Europe in general, sharing has significant resource savings potential in the domestic laundry sector. The fourth study is a conceptualisation of design fixation to higher levels of analysis. It identifies examples of fixations on the organisational and institutional level. In addition, it argues that in order to design sustainable sociotechnical systems, aspects like governmental policies and business models need to be considered design parameters. A shift to a CE needs to happen on many levels of society. This research presents simulation models that can support corporate and political decision makers in the shift to a CE. It shows that in order to understand the CE, the analysis has to be, on the one hand, able to simulate system dynamics, and on the other hand connect the multiple levels of society. De ohållbara nivåerna av resursutnyttjande och utsläpp av våra ekonomier och deras hot mot framtida generationer är en av dagens nyckelutmaningar. Cirkulär ekonomi (CE) är en konceptualisering av en ny typ av ekonomi som är baserad på återställande och regenerativ design, som siktar på att behålla nyttan och värdet så högt som möjligt i produkter, komponenter och material, indelad i deras teknologiska och biologiska cykler. Nymodigheten av CE erfordrar utvecklingen av nya analytiska verktyg och metoder så väl som annorlunda sätt att tänka för att förstå dess konsekvenser. Den här rapporten summerar fyra år av forskning på ämnet systemanalys och simulationsmodellering i domänen av CE. Tre ämnen var av högt intresse. Vilka är de miljömässiga konsekvenserna av ett skifte till CE? Vilka är de operationella konsekvenserna av ett skifte till CE? Hur kan den systematiska förändringen till en CE bli planerad och förstådd? Vi utförde fyra studier för att undersöka de tre frågorna. Första artikeln använder materialflödesanalys i en fallstudie på en tvättmaskinstillverkare, och undersöker hur olika affärsmodeller påverkar flödet av kritiska resurser. Den visar att erbjudande baserade på service leder till en högre övergripande resurseffektivitet. Den andra artikeln fokuserar på implikationerna av CE initiativ på underhållsaktiviteter för en värme-som-tjänst-distributör. Den visar att skiftet till en CE kräver att möta sämre-innan-bättre-situationer där långsiktiga fördelar kompenserar för kortsiktiga nackdelar. Tredje artikeln är en simulationsbaserad fallstudie på tvättvanor i Sverige. Det jämför ett delningsekonomiscenario där en population delar tvättmaskiner mot ett scenario där majoriteten av population är ägare av egna tvättmaskiner. Resultaten indikerar att det finns en signifikant besparingspotential av resurser både i Sverige och i Europa generellt. Fjärde artikeln är en konceptualisering av design fixation till högre analytiska nivåer. Den identifierar exempel på fixation på en organisationell och en institutionell nivå. Utöver det så argumenteras det att i design av hållbara sociotekniska system aspekter som myndighetspolicyers och affärsmodeller behöver vara designparameter. CE är ett koncept som finns i många nivåer av samhället från produktdesign till myndighetspolicyers. Det här forskning presenterar simulationsmodeller som kan stödja affärsmässiga och politiska beslutsfattare inom skiftet till en CE. Denna uppsats visar att för att förstå CE, så måste analysen dels kunna simulera systemdynamik, samt dels koppla till de multipla nivåerna i samhället. Der hohe Ressourcenverbrauch und das hohe Emissionsniveau, die mit der westlichen Lebensweise einhergehen sind ein Hauptproblem unserer Zeit. Die Kreislaufwirtschaft (zu englisch „circular economy“) ist ein alternatives Wirtschaftsmodel, das darauf abzielt, den Wert von Produkten, Komponenten und Materialien über deren Lebenszeit zu erhalten. Die relative Neuheit dieses Wirtschaftsmodels erfordert es, neue analytische Methoden, Werkzeuge und Denkweisen zu entwickeln. Diese Doktorarbeit umfasst vier Jahre Forschung an den Themen Systemanalyse und Simulationsmodellierung im Bereich der Kreislaufwirtschaft. Drei Fragen standen im Zentrum: Erstens, welche Auswirkungen hat ein Wechsel zur Kreislaufwirtschaft auf die Ressourceneffizienz? Zweitens, welche Auswirkungen hat ein Wechsel von produzierenden Unternehmen zur Kreislaufwirtschaft auf deren Betriebsführung? Drittens, wie können die notwendigen systemischen Veränderungen verstanden und geplant werden. Diese Dissertation basiert auf vier Studien, die unterschiedliche Aspekte eines gesellschaftlichen Wandels zur Kreislaufwirtschaft beleuchten. Die erste Studie ist eine Materialflussanalyse, die die Ressourceneffizienz unterschiedlicher Geschäftsmodelle eines Waschmaschinenherstellers vergleicht. Dabei stellt sich heraus, dass servicebasierte Angebote zu einer erhöhten Ressourceneffizienz führen können. Die zweite Studie untersucht die Auswirkungen einer Umstellung auf Heat-as-a-Service-Angebote aus der Sicht eines Heizgeräteherstellers und dessen Betriebsführung. Die Studie zeigt, dass der Hersteller in Situation gerät, in der kurzfristige erhöhte Kosten mit langfristigen Prozessverbesserungen und geringeren Instandhaltungskosten abgewogen werden müssen. Als drittes wird eine Simulationsstudie präsentiert, in der die Wäschepraxis in Schweden im Fokus steht. Mehrere Szenarien werden verglichen, in denen die Bevölkerung dazu übergeht, Gemeinschaftswaschküchen anstatt eigener Haushaltwaschmaschinen zu verwenden. Die Simulationsergebnisse zeigen, dass, falls umgesetzt in großen Teilen der Bevölkerung, diese Sharing Economy-Praxis ein großes Potential zur Einsparung von Ressourcen hat. In der vierten Studie wird das Konzept der „design fixation“ als mögliche Ursache für die Trägheit unserer gesellschaftlichen Systeme festgemacht. Design fixation als Phänomen beschreibt das Festhalten eines Designers an bestehenden Ideen und Konzepten, das das Endergebnis des Designprozesses einschränkt. Diese vierte Studie liefert eine Einschätzung des Einflusses von design fixation auf den Ressourcenverbrauch in sociotechnischen Systemen. Eine Umstellung zur Kreislaufwirtschaft bedeutet ein Wandel auf mehreren Ebenen der Gesellschaft. Die Komplexität dieses alternativen Wirtschaftsmodells, erfordert die Verwendung adäquater Modelle, die in der Lage sind, Gesellschaftsebenen kausal zu verknüpfen, und die entsprechenden Systemdynamiken zu simulieren. In dieser Doktorarbeit werden mehrere Simulationsmodelle präsentiert, die für Entscheidungsträger in Politik und Industrie nützlich sind, um die Kreislaufwirtschaft in ihrem Milieu besser verstehen zu können.
This book consists of chapters based on selected papers presented at the EcoDesign2015 symposium (9th International Symposium on Environmentally Conscious Design and Inverse Manufacturing). The symposium, taking place in Tokyo in December 2015, has been leading the research and practices of eco-design of products and product-related services since it was first held in 1999. The proceedings of EcoDesign2011 were also published by Springer. Eco-design of products and product-related services (or product life cycle design) are indispensable to realize the circular economy and to increase resource efficiencies of our society. This book covers the state of the art of the research and the practices in eco-design, which are necessary in both developed and developing countries. The chapters of the book, all of which were peer-reviewed, have been contributed by authors from around the world, especially from East Asia, Europe, and Southeast Asia. The features of the book include (1) coverage of the latest topics in the field, e.g., global eco-design management, data usage in eco-design, and social perspectives in eco-design; (2) an increased number of authors from Southeast Asian countries, with a greater emphasis on eco-design in emerging economies; (3) high-quality manuscripts, with the number of chapters less than half of that of the previous book.
This licentiate thesis aims to establish the basis for scientifically understanding and supporting the cognitive processes involved in the conceptual design of resource- efficient and effective product-service systems (PSSs). The research carried out is transdisciplinary in nature and includes both prescriptive and descriptive studies. First, the cognitive nature of conceptual PSS designing is investigated. Multiple pre-experimental protocol studies in a laboratory setting are carried out to do so. The cohort of these explorative studies includes experienced industrial practitioners conceptually designing a resource-efficient PSS. These descriptive studies provide quantitative insights into the cognitive effort expended by designers on various design issues and processes during conceptual PSS designing and its potential differences to conceptual product designing. These insights form the basis for future research that can eventually shine light on this complex process with statistically significant empirical results. Second, the essence of extant prescriptive PSS design principles, methods and tools is distilled through a literature analysis and synthesis of the state of the art. Subsequently, important aspects that need to be considered during conceptual PSS designing are consolidated in the form of a PSS design schema. Third, a design navigator named lifecycle-oriented function deployment (LFD) is developed. LFD is essentially a contextual decision-making support tool, developed to guide the conceptual designing of environmentally benign PSSs. This tool informs the designers regarding the potential environmental impacts of specific design parameters of an existing offering. It subsequently guides the designers in the redesign of this existing offering into a PSS with relatively benign environmental impacts. Fourth, the effects of the two proposed prescriptions are tested empirically. True experimental protocol studies are carried out in a laboratory setting to test the effects of the prescriptive PSS design schema on the cognition of PSS designers. LFD is applied in an industrial case study using the action design research method, to support the conceptual redesign of an existing product-centric offering into an environmentally benign PSS. Environmental impacts of the PSS concepts generated using LFD are then evaluated in comparison to that of the existing offering, using simulated lifecycle assessment. A semi-structured interview is carried out to evaluate the utility and usability of LFD, with the company personnel involved in the conceptual redesign process. This licentiate thesis is an effort to effectively design the future research work of the author. This future work will aim to support and establish generalizable scientific knowledge regarding the conceptual designing of resource-efficient and effective PSSs.
The development of new offerings is the engine that fuels the growth of a business enterprise. New product success is often attributed to intuition. Indeed, some offerings that stem from intuition do make it big. Yet many others crash and burn. These failures occur because intuition is only one aspect of new product development. The other key ingredient of success is having a systematic approach to developing new market offerings. Such a systematic approach for developing new offerings that create market value is outlined in this note. The discussion of the development of new offerings is complemented by an in-depth overview of two additional topics: the minimum viable offering and the key principles of prototype development. This note is an excerpt (Chapter 19) from Strategic Marketing Management: Theory and Practice by Alexander Chernev (Cerebellum Press, 2019).
In an era defined by climate change, huge resource consumption, a lack of social cohesion, rapidly accelerating technological innovations, economic shifts, and the transformation of political systems, solutions must be pursued at every level of action. This book shows how solutions from urban design and planning can, by integrating the approaches of multiple disciplines, be the first steps toward envisioning the sustainable, energy-efficient, and climate-sensitive city of the future. This book is compiled for readers from a range of professional backgrounds. Its intended audience includes the government bodies, municipalities, urban planners, engineers, architects, civil servants, and citizens who are part of urban development, from initiation through implementation. The facts and findings presented herein are relevant to any national or international debate concerning urban development which aims to create sustainable, resource-efficient, and climate-sensitive urbanization processes. The text and visuals of this book are intended to serve as a comprehensive decision support tool, taking into account that current and future urban challenges and planning tasks can only be tackled through an interlinked and stakeholder driven iterative process. As a result of the Young Cities research project, this book acts as a multilayered reference manual by providing: (a) a brief outline of the MENA region’s urban challenges; (b) a proposal for generic principles and actions for creating an energy- and resource-efficient as well as environmentally sustainable urban environment; (c) the opportunities and impacts of each discipline involved in an integrated planning process; and (d) the findings of the applied principles in the 35 ha “Shahre Javan Community” pilot project.